The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1887-03-13
SymbOlisins.

All around us lie the awful sacredness
OF babes and cradles, graves and hoary hairs;
Of grlish daughters ana of manly cares;
Of moaning signs and passionate caresses;
OF infinite ascensons of the soul,
And wild hyena hungeIs of the hesh
OF cottage virtues and the solemn roll
Of populous cities thunder, and the fresh
Warm faith of childhood, sweet as migncnetee
Amid Doubts bitter heritage, and the dear
Reglimpses of the early stars which set
Down the blue skies of our lost hemisphere,
And all tho conscientious and delights
Woven in the texture of DAYS and nights.
The daily miracle of life goes on
Within our chambers. at our ousehold hearths,
In sober duties, and in jocund mrths;
In all the unquiet hopes and fears that run
Out of our hearts along the edges of
The terrible abysses in the Gains
Of friendship, in the ecstacies of love;
In burial drges and in marriage psalms;
In all the far weird voices that we hear;
In all the mystic visions we behold;
In our souls summers when the days are clear,
And in the subtle secrets of our breath,
And that Annuuciation named death.
Oh, EARTH thou has not any wind that blows
Which is not music; every weed of thine
Pressed rightly flows in aromatic wine;
And every humble hedge.row flower that grows,
And every little brown bird that doth sing.
Hath something greater than itself and bears
A living word to every living thing.
Albeit holds the message unawares
All shapes and sounds have somethingwhich is not
OF them spirit broods among the grass;
Vague outlines of the Everlasting Thought
Lie in the melting shadows of the pass;
The touch of an Eternal Presence thrills
The fringes OF the sunset and the hills.
Forever through the worlds material forms
Heaven shoots its immateral; night and day
Apocalyptic limitations strong
Across the riffs of matter; viewless arm3
Lean longingly toward US from the air;
There is a breathing marvel in the sea;
The sapphire foreheads of the mountains wear
A light within light, which ensymbos the
Unutterable beauty and perfection
That, with immeasurable strivings, strives
Through bodied form and sensuous indrection
To hint unto our dull and hardened lives.
poor lives that cannot hear aright
The bodiless glories that are out of sight.
Sometimes. 1--WE know not how. why whence }
The twtter of the swallows meath the caves,
The simmer of the light among the leaves,
Will strike up through the thick roots of sense
| And show things which and sages
In the gray earth green dawn something doth stir
| Like organ hymns within us. and doth awe
Our pulses into listening. and confer
Burdens of being us; and we ache
With weights of revelation and our ears
Hear voices from the Infinite that take
The hushed soul captive and the saddenng years
| Seem built pillared joys, and overhead
Vast doveike wings that arch the world are spread
| He. by such raptnesses and intutions
| Doth pledge His utmost Immortality
| Unto mortal nsuffciency,
Fettered in grossness, that these sensual prisons
| Against whose bars we beat tired wings
| Avail not to ward off the clear access
| Of His high heralds and interpretings
| Wherefore. albiet may not fully guess
| The meaning of the wonder let US keep
| Clean channels for the instincts which respond
To the una terable Sanctities that sweep
| Down the far reaches of the strange Beyond.
| Whose mystery strikes the spirit into fever,
| And haunts, and hurts and besses forever.
Richard Reaif